page_title: Tanks in the Italian Army
section_title: Interwar period
hierarchical_section_title: Tanks in the Italian Army / Interwar period
context_page_description: The current C1 Ariete is the current main battle tank of the Italian Army.
context_section_description: After World War I, Italy  began to develop its own tanks from imported ones and of its own designs. So the Italian army was mainly equipped with tankettes of the L3 series in the 1930s, and these, armed with machine guns, formed the main armor strength of Italy as late as 1940. Italy began fielding heavier tanks beginning with the Fiat M11/39 with a 37 mm main gun in 1940. This tank and its derivatives, the M13/40, M14/41 and the M15/42 (all with 47 mm main guns) were closely comparable in combat power to light tanks such as the Soviet T-26. 
   
  The Carro Armato M13/40 was the successor of the M11/39 (only 100 built). Ordered for the Italian army in January 1940, it was in service from September 1940 in North Africa.
  The M13/40 had a similar chassis like the M11/39 but a redesigned hull of riveted construction varying in thickness. The driver was seated at the front of the hull on the left with the machine-gunner to his right; the latter operated the twin Modello 38 8-mm (0.315-in) machine-guns and the two-man turret with the 47-mm 32-calibre gun was in the center of the hull, with the commander/gunner and the loader operating it. A Modello 38 8-mm (0.315-in) machine-gun was mounted co-axial with the main armament and a similar weapon was mounted on the turret roof for anti-aircraft defense.
  The Carro Armato M14/41 was essentially the M13/40 fitted with a more powerful diesel engine which was equipped with air filters designed to cope with the harsh conditions of the desert.
  Production amounted to 1,103 of these vehicles, which had a similar specification to the M13/40 except for an increase in speed to 33 km/h (20 mph) and in weight to 14.5 tonnes.
  The M14/41 was a slightly improved version of the earlier Fiat M13/40 with a more powerful diesel engine. It was produced in limited numbers as it was considered already obsolete by the time of its introduction. The M14/41 used the same chassis as the M13/40 but with a redesigned hull with better armor. The M14/41 was manufactured in 1941 and 1942. Nearly 800 were produced by the time production ended.
  A heavier design, the P40 with a 75 mm main gun, was designed, but saw no service with Italian forces as it became ready at the time of the Italian Armistice with the Allies, after which the Germans took them over. The few produced after the Italian surrender were used by the Germans. The P40 design had firepower comparable to Allied and German medium tanks but was far lighter and thus less well armored. The Fiat 3000 (Model 21) was first used in action in February 1926 in Libya, and subsequently also saw action against the Ethiopians in the Second Italo-Abyssinian War in 1935. The Italians did not employ any of these tanks in Spain during the Spanish Civil War, however.
  The combat history of the L3s during the interwar period was not good. On at least two occasions during the Italian invasion of Ethiopia, L3s were put out of action by massed infantry attacks. In Spain, L3s of the Corps of Volunteer Troops (Corpo Truppe Volontarie, or CTV) were totally out-classed by the T-26 and BT-5 tanks provided to the Republican forces by the Soviet Union. Benito Mussolini decided that Fascist Italian forces should lead a fourth offensive on Madrid.  This Italian offensive resulted in the Battle of Guadalajara.  The battle ended as a decisive victory for the Republican forces.  In contrast, the Italian forces suffered heavy losses.  The Italian armor, consisting for the most part of L3/35 tankettes, proved to be no match for the tanks provided to the Republicans by the Soviet Union.
  The L3s were not a factor in the brief war between  Hungary and  Slovakia, which fielded some of them.
caption: L3/33 tank in Greece.
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